Assessing, planning and arranging your support

Why you may want an assessment

If you have care and support needs, you are entitled to a needs assessment.

Care and support is the term used to describe the help some adults need to live as well as possible with any illness or disability they may have.

It can include help with things like:

  • getting out of bed
  • washing
  • dressing
  • getting to work
  • cooking meals
  • eating
  • seeing friends
  • caring for families
  • being part of the community

The assessment will see what care and support you may need. It will also look at how this will be provided and how it will be paid for.

We will decide whether you are eligible for support based on the eligibility criteria set out by the Department of Health.

This criteria includes the following:

  • your needs must be a result of a physical or mental health condition
  • because of these needs you cannot achieve 2 or more specified outcomes
  • as a result of this, there is likely to be a significant impact on your wellbeing

The specified outcomes include:

  • basic living skills, such as dressing
  • making sure you are safe in your own home
  • being able to use your local community, such as public transport
  • being able carry out any caring responsibilities, such as for a child

The assessment will look at:

  • how your needs impact on your wellbeing
  • what you would like to achieve in your daily life

We will assess your care and support needs with you, and decide if they are at the level where you are eligible for support.

If you have eligible needs, we will discuss how you would like these met. This will be based on the information you gave us during your assessment. As far as possible we will agree your care and support plan with you.

If you decide to request a full assessment from us, a support coordinator will check whether you:

  • understand why all this information about you is being discussed and recorded
  • agree to this (give consent)
  • agree for information about you to be shared with other people who may need to know in order to provide care and support to keep you independent and well

For more information, see the social care record guarantee. 

For people who are not able to understand and give consent, then the decision to go ahead will be made with people who know them, based on whether it is thought to be in the person's best interests.

Help with your assessment

The assessment is about you and we will make sure that you are able to be involved.

If you wish, your carer, a friend or family member can help and represent you.

If you don’t have a carer, family member or friend who you can ask, and you have difficulty doing the assessment yourself, we will find an independent advocate to help you.

To request an assessment, contact adult social care by:

All new referrals are prioritised and responded to depending on the person's needs. If you are in crisis, a person is at risk, or you need a response outside normal working hours, contact us by phone.

If you're not eligible for support, we will give you information and advice to help you.

We might be able put you in touch with other organisations who can support your wellbeing and help you remain independent for longer. There could also be support within your local community. Services organised by local charities are one example.

Planning and arranging your support

Your care and support plan

Your care and support plan is based on the information we gather during your needs assessment.

It considers:

  • what needs you have
  • what you want to achieve
  • what you can do by yourself, or with the support you already have
  • what types of care and support might be available to help you in the local area

We will design your plan with you, and with others you want to involve such as a carer or a family member.

As part of the planning process, we will talk to you about your personal budget. This is the sum we have assessed that will cover your care and support.

Your personal budget will include our contribution towards those costs. This could range from all to none of the total.

By seeing how much money is available in your personal budget, you can decide how much control you want to have over arranging your care and support. 

We may be able to arrange your care and support for you. If you would like to arrange your own care, you can ask us for a direct payment to support with this instead.

A direct payment is a payment of money from us to your personal budget. We can pay it to you or to someone acting on your behalf.

Instead of arranging services for you, a direct payment can help you take full control over your own care.

If you don’t think you’ll be able to manage, you can always nominate someone else to manage your payments for you.

You do not have to do this and you may ask us to arrange support for you.

Direct payment eligibility

If we have assessed that you need help from social care, you have the right to be considered for a direct payment. This includes:

  • carers
  • older people
  • parents of a child with a disability
  • people with a disability aged 16 and over
  • people with mental health needs
  • people with learning disabilities

If there is a reason we can’t offer you a direct payment, we’ll tell you.

Calculating your direct payment

The amount of money you get will depend on the level of support you need.

It will not differ if you decide to choose a direct payment.

Direct payments are not treated as income, so are not taxable. For this reason they do not affect any benefits you may receive.

More information

To get more information on planning and arranging your support, contact us using the details below.

Contact information

Adult Social Care

Get in touch by:

If you are in crisis or a person is at risk, contact us by phone.

Outside of normal working hours, the phone number will divert to the Emergency Duty Service. They will respond to anything that cannot wait until the next working day.